everything all the same
by horormones
Summary: In which Grant Ward is actually Grant Barnes, and Grant is definitely not dealing well.


The last name_ Ward_ was an alias, given to him because of the family HYDRA shoved him into.

Grant hadn't know that little tidbit until after he'd been let out of juvie by John - the older man had come out and told him that HYDRA had been watching him his entire life, and was waiting for a good time to pull him out of real life and into the life of Best For Business spying. He was being abused for years, and HYDRA hadn't seen fit to helping him at all.

He wishes he never found out. It was too much to handle all at once, even years later.

Why is this so bad, you're thinking. You know that the family Grant was left with was a shitty excuse anyway, so what could make him not belonging to that family so bad?

First off. Bucky Barnes, presumed dead seventy years before any of the shit went down in Washington DC, was actually the Winter Soldier.

Secondly, Captain Good Guy's best friend was Scary Bad Guy Murderer Soldier, which he mentions again because he can't get his head around it (it is so wrong, so awful, so _horrible_), and also Grant's biological father.

Fuck his entire _existence_. That's his first thought. He's the son of a War hero turned assassin. Not exactly a dream life there.

His second is much, _much_ worse. He, in every way imaginable, is the product of HYDRA's best science experiment and is under the command of one of it's best agents. He is HYDRA's bitch - HYDRA's _property._ He doesn't know who his mother is, and frankly, he's scared that he was a test tube baby, made with the Soldier's DNA or sperm or whatever, and grown in a lab, then shipped off to Shithole, USA to grow up as awful as possible.

He had a sinking suspicion in his gut that said _yes_, he was.

Grant had witnessed, once, the Winter Soldier in action. The man - if you could call him that - had no remorse, no mercy, no anything. He was blank, in every sense of the word. All he cared about was completing the objective. When he got a cut, it was ignored. He didn't seem to care one bit that it could have hit an artery and he could bleed out at any given moment. That was probably why the Soldier was the best and he was just over average. The Soldier put the mission first, while he had always been selfish and put his own needs before some objective.

Adding to that, Grant regretted his entire life; he gave into the desire to be merciful; he was soft when it came to people who gave him reason to trust. Not that he _did_ trust them, because he couldn't get attached to anybody or anything - and they didn't realize that they were working with a traitor either, meaning something they needed in the Snap Judgement department was lacking.

A childish well of loneliness welled up in him, and suddenly, he wanted to see the demon that was his _father_. He wanted to see him, and try to fix him. If he even could. It seemed like the man hadn't felt anything in decades - which, knowing HYDRA, wasn't exactly off-the-table insanely impossible.

But, he couldn't do anything with the man, because not even Captain _Won The War For The U.S Of A._ America could find him. Would some agent of HYDRA with good hand/eye be able to find the ghost? Never.

And did he really _want_ to be with someone who had murdered people, then got put back on the rack for however long his handlers so desired - all after fighting in the bloodiest war the world had ever seen, anyway? Not really. That screamed of mental issues and PTSD and anxiety and claustrophobia and a billion other problems one person could have.

Anyway.

Grant was in the middle of _two whole clusterfucks_, and he wanted none of it. He wanted to be back in the woods, tbh. (That's something Skye taught him, tbh, which, wow, _painful_.)

He'd also like to blame all of his problems on Garret, but he knows that he's done everything that he has under his own free will. He could've gone to Nick Fury and told the man all about HYDRA, but he didn't. No, instead he fell in love with the enemy and didn't even try to convince her to come to his side.

He didn't want to.

Which is worse? Being the son of the goddamned Winter Soldier, or loving Skye, so innocent and caring and everything he wasn't and had once wanted to be or have?

He doesn't know. He feels like he's lost all of the things he's learned in his life.

His heart was being pulled toward Skye, his thoughts revolved around Coulson's team, Skye, his father and Garret. He felt like he was being unraveled into nothing.

And he enjoyed it.

* * *

Tony Stark offers to hold him in his tower, after everything goes down. He calls it the safest place for Grant to be.

Grant wasn't sure that was true, but went anyway. Coulson had let him choose - and he'd decided it couldn't hurt. There, he was locked onto a single floor that mostly bare, but had rooms, a mediocre kitchen (without knives) and a bathroom. He wasn't allowed anything interesting, though Jarvis would tell him stories some nights.

Sometimes, people would come to question him. Usually, he didn't answer. He didn't want to talk to anyone that wasn't Skye or Jarvis.

When Captain America came down, however, Grant _did_ talk. He told the Captain all about how he was the Winter Soldier's son. He talked and talked about HYDRA, how deep the deception was, anything. He felt guilt there, in the presence of the Captain, but didn't understand why or where it came from.

He did it mainly to shock the Captain. He liked the feeling he got when the other man's face crumpled in disbelief or anger or sadness.

Grant was a sadist. He figured it came with having the genes he did. (And the information dump told him that he sure as shit _was_ a test tube baby.) Shoot him.

Actually, he'd like that. He would really like that. Could someone shoot him? Maybe he wouldn't have to deal with his family - figuratively, of course, it's not like he'd spoken to anyone "related" or actually related to him in years - and the guilt he felt about Skye.

One day, after he'd been in Stark Tower for about a year (or so Jarvis said), Cap came down with someone new. He'd been eating his soup and contemplating pouring it down the sink when Jarvis told him he had visitors. Plural.

Sam Wilson had visited him once, and had told him about the world outside of his floor. He got a call from ex-Director Peggy Carter, in which she, with her old woman voice, had asked him how long HYDRA had been apart of SHIELD. He'd told her that SHIELD had never been without HYDRA, and when she started to cry, he had only marginal guilt. Phil Coulson and Melinda May had came early on, when he was at a bad - like, very, very bad - place, and had given him the disappointed look all SOs perfected.

This new man was... he was the fucking _Winter Soldier_. He looked kinda bad, actually, his clothes rumpled, his hair long and string, his beard unkempt. But he was staring right at Grant with eyes so blue and sad and he looked kind of hesitant, and and and - oh, God, oh, oh, _GOD_-

Cap came forward, and slapped him on the back. Grant coughed, finally breathing, and the Winter Soldier took a step back, like he was frightened. He shouldn't be the one who was frightened - he was the most experienced killer Grant knew about, having decades on even the Black Widow and Captain America.

"Oh, fuck," Grant moaned. He didn't want to do this. He didn't want anything to do with the Winter Soldier. Clearly, the Cap had forced the Soldier down there, and was going to act was a medium for them to use. "Why is _he_ here?" Grant demanded. He knew he sounded like a whiny baby, but seriously, give a guy some _warning_.

The Soldier looked pleased, almost, like he wanted to be essentially talked about while he was still there. Cap gave him The Look. "He wanted to meet you. I told him about you, and he wanted to meet you," he repeated.

Grant rolled his eyes. "Did he want to, or are you forcing him?"

"He wouldn't have come if he didn't want to." Cap told him sternly.

Grant, on some level, knew he was acting like a moody teenager, but he didn't care. He sighed, and turned to the Soldier. "Well, hi, I'm Grant, your bastard son. I came from a tube, and am HYDRA. Pleased to meet you, now if I could be _left alone_..." he said the last part imploringly, more to Cap than his father.

Father. How weird. He'd begun to think of Garrett as his father, since he wasn't supposed to meet this guy. The Soldier was never supposed to know he was alive - hadn't been told of his existence whatsoever, or even the _thought_ of him being made. _Bastard son_ was kind of an understatement.

The Winter Soldier swallowed, and Grant just knew he was going to talk. He knew all about how Assets could only talk when spoken to, but this defected ex-HYDRA assassin was, going against orders.

"I'm James. I didn't know you were alive." He offered, his English kind of stilted.

Grant rolled his eyes again. "That was kinda the point. They thought if you knew about me, then you try to slip the leash, find me and defect. Guess they weren't too far off," he said cruelly. Grant had an idea of what the knife he was twisting looked like, but he didn't care. He finally had someone to take out his frustrations on that wasn't the immovable Captain, the elderly ex-Director or a_ fucking computer_. This was so much better.

James' face closed down, his eyes blank and his mouth a thin line. "I didn't want to meet you. Steve made me. I live here, now. If you want me, ask for me," and then he was gone with the sound of the elevator doors swishing closed.

Cap sighed, and glared at him. "When I told him about you, he actually did want to know about you - I _did_ make him meet you, but he wanted to know about you. He wanted something for himself in the form of you. You should give him a chance."

Grant breathed deeply through his nose before answering. "You've read my file, haven't you? I've been HYDRA since after I escaped juvie - and I was in there because I tried to kill my family. He's the one who killed the Stark's - and was supposed to kill Captain America. We aren't good. We don't deserve people who care about us. Not to mention, we aren't exactly in the best places to be making a father-son bond - you know, I'm a prisoner and he's so muddled that he doesn't know what he wants. Sounds like a perfect time, huh?

"I can tell you're all tip-toeing around him, too, and that's not helping," he offered. "Assets were treated as disposable and translucent. He needs people to treat him like a person who has worth, and I need to speak to Skye, and then we can start something with each other. Tell him that. Make sure he knows that it's not a good time, and that will help. Until then, leave," he grunted, pointing towards the elevators.

Cap just stared at him, his glare having weakened during Grant's speech. Then, with a nod and no speech of his own, he left, and Grant was alone again, at long last.

Now he could actually think without two super soldiers breathing down his neck.

Maybe he wanted something with his father. It wasn't ever an option before, so he'd never considered it. But maybe he did - maybe he wanted everything he could get from the man, even though there probably wasn't much left up for grabs. And maybe James wanted something from him, too - maybe they could come together at some point.

Maybe.

Maybe wasn't a lot to pin hopes for some stability on. But it would have to do, especially right then. Maybe was a lot more than _never happening_, or _I'll think about it_ (aka, _I'm brushing you off, and will forget the moment I leave_).

He could work with maybe, after he sorted through some things and got to speak with Skye. Maybe was good enough for now.


End file.
